Comments sought - new WEB design

rtel wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

Hi guys,

I am changing the WEB site design, primarily because:

1) people complain about the frames on the existing site (don’t have a problem with them myself).
2) I want to arrange the ports by manufacturer, rather than architecture.  For example, all Atmel ports will be listed under Atmel, rather than under ARM7, AVR and AVR32.

Most of the content will be unchanged, but the menu system will/could be different.  Again, I actually like the tree view because its like having a site map permanently visible.  If/when the tree view gets replaced I will ensure there is a site map too.

Here are the options:

http://www.realtimeengineers.com/1.jpg
http://www.realtimeengineers.com/2.jpg
http://www.realtimeengineers.com/3.jpg

1 looks very different, but does it give the right impression as being a serious engineering site?
2 is similar to the existing sight, but cleaner.
3 is just like the existing site, but will less in the menu frame.

I would appreciate your thoughts.  FreeRTOS is gaining popularity all the time and has to adapt - it is important that it looks a bit geeking, while also giving a serious image.

If you don’t want to write something here then you can email comments to r (dot) barry _at_ freertos.org.

Thanks for any participation.

Regards.

rtel wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

I should also say I’m not going to be offended if you say bad things about the existing site, honest feedback allows improvement and I’m already aware of its shortcomings.

Regards.

dumarjo wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

Hi,

I’m not a good web designer, but i’m sure here someone can do soe good graphics to get your website attractive. I like simple website.

Continue your great work. I like the first template.

Jonathan

el_es wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

Hi,
just as an onlooker, I’d like to say that the design that stretches content from window border to border is very '90ish nowadays :slight_smile:
To express my thoughts exactly :
1) resembles some old style TTY screens (due to the green stripes, relatively narrow centre section and black background) - people who created them are starting to go away these days… or change the collar color to management and don’t want to be reminded of the old days :wink: this design is very 90’sh. Looks like one of the warez sites to me (common? usage of black background).

3) as you said, is just a copy of the old design, less frames; this one is acceptable (not going into dark ages like 1) ) if you apply some left hand/right hand margins on it - like on the 2)

but as the 2) is there, I’d say go for it - it is subtly modernized compared to the original, and has some margins, which the 3) doesn’t have.

Technically - frames are evil http://www.html-faq.com/htmlframes/?framesareevil :slight_smile:

So my preferred order is 2)winner, 3)acceptable, 1)not.

jcwren wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

I like #3.  I don’t understand what peoples complains about frames are, unless they’re browsing on a G1 or iPhone.  And the few people that do aren’t worth worrying about (I have a G1, so I fall into that category :slight_smile: )

The menu tree makes for much quicker access.

–jc

rtel wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

One vote each for all three so far…that helps, ;o)

Regards.

jorick23 wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

Put me down for #3.  I like the menu on the side.

edwards3 wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

>Put me down for #3. I like the menu on the side.

What about combining #2 and #3. Remove the frames, keep the menu on the left, change the menu design to a more traditional one instead of the tree.

Disadvantage would be that you would loose the statefulness of the tree which always shows the branches you expanded and clicked.

rtel wrote on Friday, April 17, 2009:

If anybody is still about on a Friday night…here is number 4:

http://www.realtimeengineers.com/4.jpg

This is an attempt at clean/de-cluttered but still simple.  I need to work on the menu a bit.

[thanks for the personal emails, sorry I cannot answer all individually]

rtel wrote on Saturday, April 18, 2009:

I have updated - choosing a (hopefully) simpler and cleaner version of the original - nothing radical.  Hope it meets with approval.

Regards.

alainm3 wrote on Monday, April 20, 2009:

Hi Richard,

congratulations, you managed to make a nice and modern looking site, without loosing any of the good things that you had in the old one.

Specialy  the left side hierachy menu. With a bonus: I am able to resize the left side for long entries or if I am on my notebook with (only!) 1024 width!!!

Alain

alainm3 wrote on Tuesday, April 21, 2009:

There is a VERY BIG PROBLEM  with the new site: all external links go only to the main page.

I cannot find all my knowlwdge that is stored in links to the respective pages…

Alain

rtel wrote on Tuesday, April 21, 2009:

> There is a VERY BIG PROBLEM  with the new site: all external
> links go only to
> the main page.

This is because I added a small script to ensure the menu frame was visible:

    // Check in expected frame
    if (top.location == self.location) {
        top.location = ‘index.html’
    }

I need to change this so it opens up the menu frame without also jumping to the home page - but I don’t know how to do that ;o)

Regards.

hunorca wrote on Tuesday, April 21, 2009:

Ah… pleeease fix this… My saved links are useless now :frowning:

ps. drop the frames, they ARE evil :slight_smile:

vchandra wrote on Thursday, April 23, 2009:

Hello Richard,

Website is really good.

My comments:

- It is going to once gain Home page when i click "OpenRTOS and SafeRTOS" link in main page. Is it expected one?

Regards

rtel wrote on Thursday, April 23, 2009:

> - It is going to once gain Home page when i click "OpenRTOS
> and SafeRTOS" link
> in main page. Is it expected one?

Fixed - thanks.

Regards.

yyang2000 wrote on Thursday, April 23, 2009:

Hi Richard,

I am still preferring the #3 website.  It was easy for me to get the stuffs what I wanted.

Regards,

rtel wrote on Saturday, April 25, 2009:

>Ah… pleeease fix this… My saved links are useless now :frowning:

I think this is fixed now :o) and you bookmarks should be working once again.  You might need to clear out the caches in your browser.

Regards.

ericwalker wrote on Tuesday, April 28, 2009:

Richard,

The aesthetics of the new site are fine.  However, there is one functional change that is quite annoying.  With the old site I could browse as normal with the tree frame on the left and then, I could selectively open a page in a new tab without the frames.  With the new site when I try to do this it insists on reloading all the frames.

The old way was the best of both worlds.  I had the tree to make navigating easy in the beginning.  Then when I found what I was looking for I could open it in a new tab without the frames.  Opening a page I want to study without the frames made the site considerably better.  When I am done navigating and want to begin studying, the header and navigation frames take away screen space and add no function.  With them there I have to do a lot more scrolling up and down as much less content fits on the screen at any time.

I understand there might be a concern about someone linking directly to a sub-page and not having the frames.  Adding a small link at the top or bottom of each page to either reload the page with frames enabled or to go to the main homepage would suffice.

Overall the new site looks nice but, please re-enable the lost functionality.  Thank you.

-Eric Walker

hunorca wrote on Wednesday, May 06, 2009:

My bookmarks really work now! :slight_smile:

Thanks a lot!